As if Turkey’s membership talks weren’t already under enough pressure from the French referendum, today we have the suggestion that a change of government in Germany will only serve to complicate the picture even further.

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Understanding Ivan.

Fear Returns to Russia.
“I was covering Nikitin’s trial in 1999, and after one session in court I asked the prosecutor to comment on the progress of the case.
‘If I were you I would be very careful,’ responded the prosecutor, Alexander Gutsan. ‘Particularly since you have a little boy.’”

Amongst all the other decisions made at the summit, Croatia is now an official EU candidate state. Talks are scheduled to begin next year with an aim of the Croats joining alongside Romania and Bulgaria in 2007.

Russia and the Baltic republics, and now the EU. A fraught relationship, not least because of suspicions of bad faith on both sides. What is to be done? Some thoughts from a key Munich think tank, in German.

Georgian President Saakashvili has disbanded the Adjaran parliament and installed direct rule in the province after the departure of Aslan Abashidze. Living with Caucasians has an interesting on-the-ground perspective on the events before the flight of Abashidze

Voting takes place today in the Cypriot referendums on the UN peace plan. The final polls indicated that Turkish Cypriots would vote in favour while Greek Cypriots would vote against.

Kofi Annan has now produced a final plan for Cyprus which will be put to referendums in the two halves of the island

The Greek government doubts that an agreement over Cyprus will be reached before the deadline for negotiations to conclude, which will mean Kofi Annan will be required to impose a solution before referendums are held

Another search for Radovan Karadzic has ended in failure